Snow

33 | hermanita, ¿estás bien?

❝say what you have to say. try not to cry. this is just not what you wanted
at this point in your life.❞

❘❘

"IT'S NOVEMBER, NEVA."

It's fucking November. Why can't I remember anything about October?

October is just this big fucking blur of smoke and sex, intertwined into some destructive pattern of feeling. Where did I lose los días, las horas, los minutos, los segundos? When did everything start bleeding together into a catastrophic collision of chasing city lights and cocaine crashes?

It's an unstoppable reel beneath my eyelids, but none of it connects—a slew of deliriously dizzy colors in clubs and temptingly tattooed skin and cold bathroom tiles and crying and cursing and crumbling and coming down, down, down.

I nod solemnly, blinking back las memorias and averting my gaze. "Yeah. It's... November 7th. Our meeting. I remembered."

Barely.

"I'm glad to see you here." A sliver of genuine concern taints his words, and as that sinks in, vuelvo a asentir. "Is everything okay, Neva?"

It's that unspoken question, that heavy, heartbreaking preocupación that's been hanging in the air since I stepped in—since his gaze fell to the bruise across my cheek.

"Sí, sí, sí." I wave him off with a breathless laugh, somewhat forced and awkward. With a dry throat and a pounding headache, la mentira rolls with the unsettling sickness simmering in my stomach. "Yeah, I'm okay."

"Neva, if you need help, I—"

"I said I'm okay," I snap.

Silence chases the sharp response; it stews and festers into a stifling tension, thick and tangible.

When Meir presses his lips together, I straighten. Agitation floods through me, churning, turning, burning, almost begging for him to pick a fight, but then our eyes lock, and everything vanishes. A ripple of pain strikes me cold, replacing the impulsive anger with something else.

Una ansia.

Butterflies clog my throat. A little flustered and frustrated, I tuck my hair back behind my ears with warm cheeks. In a softer voice, I reassure him, "I'm fine."

"Okay." Though his tone suggests a surrender, a challenge gleams in his eyes. "But just remember, your mental health and your safety is what's most important."

Safety. Quiero gritar o llorar, but I just nod blankly.

"Alright, Neva, then let's talk about your dissertation."

Nerves creep up. Trembling fingers drop into my lap. A shaky sigh escapes, defeat dimming the gnawing ache inside of me. "Yeah. Okay."

Meir offers me a patient smile. "You never sent me an email to check in. Do you have anything to show me?"

I swallow hard.

There's some half-written paper lost somewhere on Dropbox, branded onto a thumb drive, just laid out in the notes on my phone, but it's this vulnerably broken thing that I can't even begin to pull apart and polish... or expose.

Because Julian didn't come back to the apartment that first night, or that second night, or that third night. I spent every night alone, plagued by gruesome nightmares of babies being torn from arms or wombs, of a dead stranger and her child, of a little girl in a pretty pink bow growing up without a mother, and every fucking night, I woke in a cold sweat, gasping, shaking, crying.